A military coup happened in a place I have never heard of. Let's go to the map:

The man who was the dictator former leader of the country was out of the country attending the funeral of King Fahd. The people are apparently very happy:

"There was no democracy here, there was just slavery. We have been freed from a dictatorship," said one man, Bilal, aged around 45, watching from a side street.

"It's like we've been imprisoned for decades. I'm so happy. Change is good. We've been disappointed by the regime," shouted Mohammed, in his early 20s, as he ran down the street.

The big question is "Now what?" and the answer seems to be that military rule will happen for two years. PubliusPundit says that this will be an interesting thing to watch:

There are significant challenges that are posed to the Bush Doctrine by this situation. First of all, Mauritania is an Islamic Republic whose system of law is based partially on sharia. There are some pretty radical Islamic leaders, and certainly there are elements of Al Qaeda in and around the country. Since the country doesn’t have a liberal civil society yet, elections would only bring into power other dictators. The other question that has to be wondered about is whether a military coup can assuredly bring about democracy.

Posted by Ryan S. on Wednesday, August 03, 2005 at 2:08 PM | Permalink |